"Your Majesty, this is a newly improved catapult." The workshop pushed a new catapult onto the playground.
If a worker wants to do his job well, he must first sharpen his tools. Li Yue has never given up on the improvement of weapons, armor and equipment.
This thing is much larger than the previous Thunderbolt Car, and the throwing object has also been improved. The original kerosene has been changed to a mixture of saltpeter, charcoal, and kerosene, which makes the explosion and combustion more violent.
"Test firing." Li Yue remembered that the original black powder was a mixture of nitrate, charcoal, and sulfur in a certain proportion.
However, saltpeter and sulfur are more difficult to obtain these days.
Storage and transportation are difficult.
It can only exert miraculous effects on specific battlefields and be applied on a large scale. The conditions are not yet mature and there is no need.
Squeak, squeak...
The five craftsmen operated the catapult, and with a whoosh, the pottery pot was thrown out.
But whether it was due to the strong wind or a problem with the fuse, the clay pot did not explode or burn, and was shattered on the ground.
Li Yue glanced sideways at everyone, "You are so serious about this just to show me this?"
Several people had cold sweats on their faces, "I'm sorry... Your Majesty, I was negligent for a moment..."
He started tinkering in a hurry again.
This time it was successful. Two hundred steps away, there was a bang and flames soared into the sky.
The power and range have indeed increased, but it is based on the enlargement of the trebuchet. It is not considered an improvement, let alone an innovation.
Li Yue looked at this guy who was twice as big as the Thunderbolt Car. It was a troublesome thing to transport and dismantle this thing. Judging from many years of war experience, this thing was not practical.
"This thing is not good. Don't always improve on the basis of predecessors, but make more innovations, such as..." Li Yue recalled the counterweight trebuchet he had seen in the game.
That is the Hui Hui Pao that appeared in the Yuan Dynasty.
It can throw rocks weighing four to five hundred kilograms, which is much stronger than the current thunderbolt carts that weigh twenty or thirty kilograms.
I don’t know the specific details, but I know that it is made through principles such as winches, pulleys, and levers.
There were already winches in the Wei and Jin Dynasties, and lever pulleys were available in the Spring and Autumn Period.
Once you understand the principle, it will not be difficult to get things done.
Li Yue drew a sketch based on his memory and marked the approximate height. "Follow this diagram and redesign it. Don't always think about using manpower. Use zip lines and winches more often."
Several craftsmen looked at the sketch blankly, "Can...this thing work?"
"If it works, make it first and improve it step by step." Li Yue was too lazy to explain.
After recruiting so many craftsmen, you have to make something new, right?
Suddenly something moved in his heart. When he captured Qiuci, Lu Guang captured a large number of craftsmen from the Western Regions, and some of them might be proficient in machinery.
Even if not, once the two sides are combined, maybe there will be sparks.
"Let's do this. You select the most skilled craftsmen, and I select a group from the craftsmen in the Western Regions, and we will work on both sides at the same time." Li Yue only believed that great efforts would produce miracles.
Besides, this thing is not high-tech.
"How is this possible? China has always been sophisticated and ingenious, how can the barbarians from the Western Regions compare with it?" Several old craftsmen blew their beards and stared.
Li Yue laughed, "Don't underestimate them. They each have their own strengths. I just want results. Whoever comes up with it will be rewarded."
A ruler is longer and an inch is shorter.
The large number of people in the Central Plains sometimes limits the development of technology. Anyway, everything can be done by manpower, so there is no need to improve technology.
There were few people in the Western Regions, so they tried every means to borrow strength.
Of course, this is just Li Yue's personal opinion. Having more people is not always a good thing, and having few people is not always a bad thing.
The city of Xiangyang is really strong, and I don’t know how many people will die just because of the heap of human lives.
"Your Majesty, don't worry, we will never lose to the barbarians!" Several people hurried away with the sketches.
"Your Majesty, what should I do with this thing?" the guard pointed at the large trebuchet.
"Burn these stupid, big and thick things." Li Yue had already pointed out the direction for them. If they still couldn't figure it out, they might as well just disband.
If you can enter Taixue, your skills will definitely not be bad.
Li Yue immediately sent someone to ask the Qiuci craftsmen.
There are people who know woodcraft, but their level is not as good as that of a general workshop, and the language is not fluent, so someone needs to translate.
Li Yue took the trouble to explain the principles and what to build.
This group of people stared at each other, and finally understood with great reluctance.
Within a month, both sides had things out.
However, it is far from what Li Yue had in mind. The craftsmen from the Central Plains made it look like a swallow tail and required hundreds of people to operate it.
I don’t know what the Qiuci craftsmen came up with. They just added winches, levers, and pulleys to the traditional catapult.
After a test launch, the craftsmen of Qiuchi built something that was inferior to traditional projection vehicles.
Instead, the things in the workshop were closer to what Li Yue wanted. A forty kilogram stone could be thrown more than one hundred and fifty steps, which was already a great improvement and much stronger than the original catapult.
This is a good start. Once the thing is built, the rest is to study.
"Each person will be rewarded with five sheep and five stones of grain. On this basis, they can improve each other. If you need anything, go directly to the treasury to get it." Li Yue was quite satisfied and dismissed the Qiuci craftsmen. These people are good at blacksmithing, but they can do this. " "High-end" gadgets are too hard to come by.
Qiuci is known as a great power in the Western Region, but it is completely incomparable to China.
The larger the population base, the more talents will be produced.
This is incomparable to Qiuci. Besides, the things in Qiuci come from Tianzhu and Persia in the west, not their origin.
The Sixteen Kingdoms and the Southern and Northern Dynasties were an era that inherited the past and ushered in the future. All ethnic groups merged, there was a small collision of ideas, and the Central Plains ushered in a small explosion of technology.
Not only armor and weapons advanced by leaps and bounds, but astronomy, geography, medicine, and agriculture also exploded, and then the later Sui and Tang Dynasties were created.
There is no reason why a counterweighted trebuchet that knows the principles cannot be built.
For two months at the end of the year, Li Yue withdrew from the harem and focused exclusively on the design of the trebuchet. He spent all his time eating, drinking and having sex in Taixue.
Learn from each other's strengths and weaknesses, integrate the strengths and weaknesses of both sides, and make improvements step by step.
The projected weight ranges from forty to fifty, sixty, and ninety pounds, and the shooting range ranges from one hundred and fifty steps to one hundred six, one hundred, eighty, and one hundred and ninety steps...
The catapults got bigger and bigger.
When I reached 110 pounds and 200 steps, I seemed to have reached my limit.
If the weight is increased, either the range will be reduced or the catapult will not be able to carry it.
"It's almost done. Let's build it according to this standard. The standards of various components must be unified to facilitate disassembly, transportation and assembly." Li Yue rubbed his forehead. If he wanted to go further, he would have to spend more energy.
After all, he is the Emperor of Liang. He has too many things to deal with and cannot really focus on getting into them.
There are more things to plan for the new year.
With its current power, it should be enough to attack Xiangyang.
No matter how good the siege equipment is, it is only an auxiliary. The decisive victory on the battlefield depends on the soldiers on both sides, the battlefield situation, and the support of the people.
Li Yue adopted a multi-pronged approach and did not pin all his hopes on the trebuchet.
"Take the order." The craftsmen all breathed a sigh of relief.
(End of chapter)
